Photo credit: Randal Dean

It’s been more than a year since his death, but Marchel Ivery’s legend is alive as ever here in North Texas.

On Thursday night, Jazz in the Atrium at the Dallas Museum of Art dedicates its second annual Tenor Madness concert to Ivery. That comes on the heels of a similar tribute in November held at the Sammons Center.

Performers at Thursday night’s even include tenor saxophone player Shelley Carrol, who has toured with the Duke Ellington Orchestra; Pianist Roger Boykin, who teaches at Booker T. Washington High School for the Visual & Performing Arts and who was one of the stars of this fall’s South Dallas Pop on KERA; and drummer Andrew Griffith, who began playing with Ivery in the early ’90s.

Sitting near the front you are sure to see Hope Crouch, the mother of Ivery’s 6-year-old daughter, Gloria.

Events like this one mean a lot to her.

“It’s a comfort to my heart,” she said Wednesday. “I believe it’s only Marchel’s due as a great musician and a beautiful man and beautiful human being.”

Hope says that Gloria is becoming quite a jazz fan herself. And it’s nights like this that provide Hope an opportunity to teach their daughter more about her father.

“For Christmas I bought her a wooden school ruler – she’s in kindergarten now – and it had ‘rulers of music’ on one [side] and ‘rulers of jazz’ on another. It bothers me that Marchel’s name is not on the ‘rulers of jazz.’ So this is a way for her to learn his place in the history of music and the jazz vanguard and to be with friends who love us.”

The event starts at 6 p.m. and is free to the public. If you’d like to read more about Ivery, The Dallas Morning News wrote a nice appreciation of him last year. And if you would like to make a donation in his memory, the Sammons Center has a pair of charitable funds set up in his name.

About the photo: The accompanying photo of Marchel Ivery was taken by Dallas photographer Randal Dean. You can see more of Randal’s work on his Flickr page.